中国城市再生中原住居民法律地位保障路径探析

Urban territorial spacenot only contains the material value of human production and daily life but also embodies the spiritual meaning of communal social life. As China enters an era of “regeneration” focused on stock-based urban assets, the legal system for urban regeneration has been progressively improved in practice. Its fundamental pur pose is to harmonize the protection of property owners’ rights with the safeguarding of original residents’ living environment rights, while at the same time realizing the public value of preserving historical and cultural heritage. However, the current legal and institutional framework for urban regeneration still faces significant limitations. Specifically, original residents’ participation is often delayed, lacking legal and institutional guarantees at the initial stage. Participatory mechanisms are not sufficiently detailed, resulting in weak operability and the absence of differentiate d institutional design. In addition, external expert consultation systems remain underdeve loped, making it difficult to effectively represent the interests of vulnerable groups. Furth ermore, statutory minimum standards for substantive rights have not yet been fully legisla ted, leading to fairness concerns in resource allocation in certain regeneration projects. These deficiencies not only cause some residents’ rights and interests to be undermined but also restrict the progress of legal rule and standardization in urban regeneration. This dissertation focuses on “the legal protection of original residents’ status in urban regeneration.”Using normative analysis, case studies, and comparative legal methods, it systematically examines both the theoretical foundations and practical pathways for impr oving rights protection within China’s legal framework. The research finds that the current system relies excessively on property owners, resulting in the marginalization of non-pr operty actors such as tenants, migrants, and small business owners, who lack direct legal remedies. The case ofDachong Village in Shenzhendemonstrates this imbalance vividly: original villagers (as property owners) gained enormous economic benefits, whereas tens of thousands of temporary residents were deprived of even basic housing rights, exposin g the imbalance of a property-centered system. From the perspective of procedural rights, although the law grants property owners the rights of consultation and voting, these are usually exercised only at the level of renewal unit plans and implementation stages. As a result, residents cannot exert meanin gful influence during the early stages of fundamental planning, policy guidance, or progr am design. Such “post hoc participation” represents a structural flaw in the procedural design of urban regeneration. For example,Shanghai’s “dual consultation system”strength ened opinion-gathering in the compensation and resettlement stages, but it is insufficient to remedy deeper procedural shortcomings. Regarding substantive rights, although theShenzhen Special Economic Zone Urban Renewal Regulationsprovide a statutory minimum standard of equal-value property-for-pr operty exchange, tenants and users are still excluded from direct relocation or resettleme nt rights, relying only on indirect contractual compensation through rental agreements. This highlights the urgent need for legislative reform to ensure the livelihood and fundam ental rights of original residents. Comparative legal analysis shows that theUnited Kingdom, the United States, and Japanhave institutionalized mechanisms for community participation to secure residents’ substantive roles in urban regeneration. Examples include the UK’sCity ChallengeandSing le Regeneration Budget, and Japan’sCommunity Building OrdinanceandUrban Renaissanc e Special Measures Act.These models suggest that China should advance the timing of participation, refine the structure of participatory rights, and institutionalize expert commi ttees and social organizations, thereby ensuring vulnerable groups have substantive voice s in the process. Ultimately, this dissertation argues that constructing a legal framework centered onli ving environment rightswill allow China’s urban regeneration to shift from a property-cen tered paradigm to a people-oriented, rule-of-law-based model, thereby achieving an orga nic integration of spatial renewal and social justice.